SEO Trends in 2017

An Interview with VP of Experience Strategy, Meri Gulyan.

The SEO industry is always evolving, so it pays to be aware of what your competitors are doing, and why. In order to accomplish competitive dominance, you should be aware of how search engines are changing, and adjust your content and strategy before the competition has a chance to catch up.

In an interview with our VP of Experience Strategy, Meri Gulyan, we got her take on what the rest of 2017 could look like, what SEO trends to look out for, and how digital marketers can leverage the changes.

What trends will we see with SEO in 2017?

People, not machines, will power SEO in 2017. As hot as the opposite trend is in other tech platforms, people drive what happens on search. It's their search experience that crafts SEO, and what needs to be evaluated versus what historically seems like the technical experience. Yes, making sure your site is optimized is important, but that's just the basics.

If we don't ask ourselves where the user wants to go and how they want to get there, then we're failing at understanding how user behaviors tie to search.

Content will continue to dominate because, again, people are searching for exactly that; whether it be videos, articles, or infographics, people need to find it quickly.

Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) will also see a big rise. Again, it's all about the quickness of finding what you want. Since AMP loads are significantly faster than sites, there will be companies everywhere figuring out how to use this to their advantage.

How will SEO be different from it's been before? What will your agency do differently?

The shift will be all about the user, not the engine.

Our agency will look at user flows to see who are landing on which page and why. We will also look at optimizing experiences before optimizing an H4.

Will SEO and PR become more intertwined?

Yes! AMP proves that people want quick, digestible content, and Google recognizes that. PR is all about exposure, and SEO is about users finding that exposure. Together, they'll bring more insight to a company, person, or event, etc. With platforms, such as SnapChat and Facebook Live, the goal is to give users data quickly. PR can easily leverage that model and make sure data is out there for all those wanting to be "in the know."

Core Expertise

LA Digital Agency

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